


Friends are the Family that Choose You Back

by peoriapeoria



Series: Fitter of the Species [21]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: BFFs, Canon Character of Color, Ensemble Cast, Gen, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-15
Updated: 2015-12-15
Packaged: 2018-05-06 21:03:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,303
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5430734
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peoriapeoria/pseuds/peoriapeoria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Colonel James Rhodes, Air Force isn't an Avenger, but he is Tony Stark's friend. POV overview of events in this AU series. Friendships are primary in this work, the rating is for comic book violence recounted.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

"He's come in."

Tony was tuning War Machine, had come specially to the Flats to observe maneuvers. Rhodey figured this wasn't purely for his benefit, so he listened. One had to be so careful to listen, because Tony never said the important things loudly or clear.

"He."

"Barnes."

He almost thought it's a riff on Scotty and his poor engines, until he considered that Captain America was living at the Tower with a collection of superheroes. James Buchanan Barnes had died during World War Two, had become synonymous with the Howling Commandos now known to have been commanded by a woman. 

"How?"

"Walked in, needed repairs."

Listening to Tony could be a frustrating process, entire sentences were lost due to him thinking faster than he could speak. Barnes would have to be over ninety years old.

Zola. He'd read the released files of SHIELD/HYDRA, was aware the scientist had been conducting experiments on POWs during the war, had been brought Stateside through Operation Paperclip. Mostly that had been rocket men. Barnes had been a POW, had been in the 107th. Captain America liberated that forced labor factory.

"Why would he come to you?" He supposed that Barnes would have known Howard Stark. That had become an open secret, Stark directly supporting the war through the SSR.

"The arm. Lift yours. Both of them." Tony demonstrated.

He thought it was a pose out of Karate Kid, but at least he could keep both legs on the ground. War Machine wasn't dead weight but finesse wasn't the suit's strength.

Arm. Tony couldn't be saying what he'd just put together.

"Yeah. The Asset killed my parents."

The Asset was undefined in the data dump. If that's what happened to D.C. and Barnes had an arm needing repair--

"Where is he?" He'd seen what had happened to Steve, and that had been hours after the fact. She'd been able to keep fighting in Manhattan, her recovery so fast she healed as she moved.

"Home. Safe."

No. There could be nothing safe about what happened in D.C. being at home. "What does Bruce think?" He could tell Tony hadn't considered it from that angle. It wasn't often he got to see Tony think something out.

"Steve's less haunted."

That made one. They said no more on the matter.


	2. Chapter 2

He'd been nervous meeting Steve. Tony probably wasn't supposed to let him know she was the original, it wasn't part of the media storm that swept in the wake of the attempted alien invasion in NYC. Maybe he'd have been less nervous, not thinking of her as part of the Greatest Generation.

In the end, he was struck by just how young she was. Tony had rented a private room at a fancy restaurant, one that did serve food in addition to presentation. It had been just the five of them, Steve, Bruce, Pepper, Tony and himself. He'd observed her scanning the menu for prices.

"Tell you what, bring us whatever the chef approves, enough for ten people, and get a starter out in the next 10 minutes, bring the rest as we run out."

He'd thought it was Tony showing off, for Dr Banner he'd supposed. On reflection, it was to nip whatever Steve would have said in the bud. The kitchen kept it from being awkward, somehow. It was an interesting evening, Bruce was smart as a whip, kept Tony dancing, a relief to Pepper and himself. Steve piped in whenever they came out of the stratosphere, or rather when they descended to that from low-earth orbit. She also ate the 'extra' food easily; Tony must have known.

His position between Steve and Bruce gave him another insight, this one chemistry. It was subtle, but there was interest, a frisson. Later he figured out who Banner was when he wasn't teasing out science's secrets. Yeah, he supposed 'singular life experiences' was something they shared.


	3. Chapter 3

He landed on Avengers Tower, next to the Iron Man disassembly runway as soon as he could clear a window with the Air Force. Officially the suit was still Iron Patriot but the rebranding paint job had been toned down, air force blue and ivory threaded red. Machinery responded helping him decant from the exoskeleton.

"You made it!" Tony hugged Rhodey, drink in hand, proffering the drink as he pulled back.

Rhodey sniffed the drink and sipped cautiously. Nothing his liver couldn't handle. He hadn't heard anything worrisome, no world leaders suspiciously dead accidentally. He had gone over the Asset portion of the file with a fine tooth search. D.C. had been a shitshow on purpose. Terror theater, shock and awe, softening the population to death from the sky, an opening act for Insight. Security in our time.

He'd also looked into the reports of the car crash. The investigation was wrapped up hastily, Howard's celebrity and infamous drinking combining into a protective cover-up. He doesn't think the car was tampered with. He thinks it was shot. A moving target, and it was shot off the road.

The party inside is at full swing. It's more sedate than Tony's old parties. It's smaller for one thing, and it's not nearly as loud. He recognizes Sam Wilson and Natasha right away; her cover was so blown by the Congressional hearings. He picks out Bruce, Steve.

"Is that Doctor Foster?"

"Jane, this is Rhodey! MIT!" Tony sailed off as the petite scientist turned and approached.

They got into an absorbing conversation, such that he only noticed the huge blond at his powerful backslap. "You must be Tony's brother, he's said many good things of you."

"Thor." He notices he said it in unison with Dr. Foster. He grants her ground. The two settle together, Jane picking up her thread eagerly. The Asgardian was utterly besotted, soaking in the doctor's excitement.

A bubbly young woman sheered them apart, a mix of sheep dog and missile, sending Jane and Thor to mingle. "She can come back later, Jane needs to speak to three new people and it's better starting early and getting it out of the way." It turned out Darcy was interesting, and he figured her brash was tactical, like sending up chaff.

Steve and Bruce were doing the two person sally, regrouping and splitting off just the way his parents had at Christmas and weddings. He wondered just who the red-headed man was, having finally placed Hawkeye. His reason for coming, Barnes, wasn't in sight.

Except he was, had been all along. He'd been thinking, once Darcy moved on, that he was her plus one, since the long hair, that was kids these days. He's seen those eyes before, in the mirror, on soldiers coming from the field, in his history book. The face is the same. James Buchanan Barnes.

"Colonel Rhodes, Phil Coulson." 

How did the man move? They shook hands. He noticed how the other man looked to Steve and Sam before back to him. Spook. 

"Do you play pool?"

This is how he ended up meeting Maria Hill over the green felt. Killer. He was wondering her branch until Pepper stole her to talk shop, Stark business. SHIELD, she was part of the grain gathering.

"So, what is it?"

He is not used to being snuck up on like this. Then again, company included. "Tony is my friend."

The man tilted his head, like he was rolling the statement around. "Steve's my friend. Has been since I was a boy."

That put a new spin on things. Made it more explicable that he'd stayed, joined the Howling Commandos. Rhodes had seen Steve after D.C., had ordered Wilson to stay with her, because with even all the guards--

"I almost killed Steve. So I get your concern. It's reasonable, sound. More than anything that happens here."

He laughed. "Truth."


End file.
